"The real issue is our susceptibility to the insatiable human need to belong, and the only real way to address this is to recognize that each of us needs to develop a strong sense of self—a reindividuation—in order to be fully realized in our personhood and avoid the hive mentality."
I couldn't agree more. People who have a strong sense …
"The real issue is our susceptibility to the insatiable human need to belong, and the only real way to address this is to recognize that each of us needs to develop a strong sense of self—a reindividuation—in order to be fully realized in our personhood and avoid the hive mentality."
I couldn't agree more. People who have a strong sense of belonging as part of a family or community clubs, religious, or other organizations have less need to join political or other more distant, abstract groups to satisfy belonging needs. Much of the de-individuation we see today comes, I believe, as a result of breakdown of family and community structures. Isolated in apartments/houses and experiencing social interactions primarily on-line result in people, especially teens and young adults, to subsume their identity within larger "movements." Additional fuel for the de-individuation comes from a diminished sense of purposefulness for one's life. If not committed to a provider or caring role in the raising of children, people look for other sources to give them purpose, and socio-political movements can fill that void (at least for a while).
Agreed. I was having a conversation with my sister over the holidays about the decline of communities, and how the ones we’ve replaced them with are ill suited. The piece she would have written would have focused on that aspect, I didn’t feel I could write that authentically so I wrote this piece instead. But the themes of the family, extended family and community decline certainly were in my thoughts while writing this one.
"The real issue is our susceptibility to the insatiable human need to belong, and the only real way to address this is to recognize that each of us needs to develop a strong sense of self—a reindividuation—in order to be fully realized in our personhood and avoid the hive mentality."
I couldn't agree more. People who have a strong sense of belonging as part of a family or community clubs, religious, or other organizations have less need to join political or other more distant, abstract groups to satisfy belonging needs. Much of the de-individuation we see today comes, I believe, as a result of breakdown of family and community structures. Isolated in apartments/houses and experiencing social interactions primarily on-line result in people, especially teens and young adults, to subsume their identity within larger "movements." Additional fuel for the de-individuation comes from a diminished sense of purposefulness for one's life. If not committed to a provider or caring role in the raising of children, people look for other sources to give them purpose, and socio-political movements can fill that void (at least for a while).
Agreed. I was having a conversation with my sister over the holidays about the decline of communities, and how the ones we’ve replaced them with are ill suited. The piece she would have written would have focused on that aspect, I didn’t feel I could write that authentically so I wrote this piece instead. But the themes of the family, extended family and community decline certainly were in my thoughts while writing this one.